


You Mendacious Sons of Bitches

by MxFelicitations



Category: Gentlemen of the Road - Michael Chabon, The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, BAMF Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, BAMF Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Con Artists, Established Relationship, Guilt, Handwaving the history and geography of the Silk Road in the 12th century, Happy Ending, Healing, Hustling, Immortal Husbands Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, M/M, Pre-Movie: The Old Guard (2020), Temporary Character Death, barfights, gentlemen of the road, no beta we die like men, the silk road
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:53:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25833085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MxFelicitations/pseuds/MxFelicitations
Summary: "The young man sitting by the fire was almost certainly a Frank. He was freakishly slender and pale, with unsettling eyes the color of bottle-glass and a bizarre thin goatee. Surrounded by a milling crowd of strong, broad, powerful men with handsome, dark skin and full beards, the Frank looked practically skeletal and downright effeminate. He had spoken to almost nobody except the innkeeper, sat by himself, wore his hood pulled low, and ate his meal in recalcitrant silence. The dozen or so onlookers privately decided he probably didn’t even speak the language. What a bastard."--Yes, this is a homage to Michael Chabon's delightful Jewish adventure novel "Gentlemen of the Road" (2007). Set in the 10th century in the Kaganate of Khazaria, the novel is a swashbuckling adventure about two traveling con artists and lifelong soulmates: Amram, a brawling Abyssinian with a passion for shatranj and his beloved war-axe, and Zelikman, a thin, troubled Frank who fights with a delicate rapier. When I fell in love with our beloved Joe and Nicky, I knew this pairing had to be written.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 34
Kudos: 370





	You Mendacious Sons of Bitches

**Author's Note:**

> After many years in many fandoms, including many attempts at fanfic over the years, The Old Guard struck me to my core and opened up the floodgates. Please enjoy the first fic I have ever successfully finished and shared on AO3. 
> 
> Warning: Set in a crowded inn somewhere on the Silk Road in the twelfth century, this story plays fast and loose with both history and geography. This story also includes period-typical racism about the interlopers the local community would call "Franks."
> 
> Please enjoy and share a comment with your thoughts and feedback!

The inn was the sort of place that didn’t have a name. It had squatted there since time immemorial, back when the trade routes were little more than goat paths and the only visitors were traveling merchants making the long trek to Shiraz. These days, the routes had gotten wider, the carts and caravans had gotten more numerous and frequent, and the travelers came from farther outposts every year - this one from Damascus, that one from Samarkand, the other from Zhangye. Sometimes you even saw those odd, pale Franks with light eyes and hawkish beaks of noses - and very rarely, you got men from Kievan Rus with strange braided beards.

The young man sitting by the fire was almost certainly a Frank. He was freakishly slender and pale, with unsettling eyes the color of bottle-glass and a bizarre thin goatee. Surrounded by a milling crowd of strong, broad, powerful men with handsome, dark skin and full beards, the Frank looked practically skeletal and downright effeminate. He had spoken to almost nobody except the innkeeper, sat by himself, wore his hood pulled low, and ate his meal in recalcitrant silence. The dozen or so onlookers privately decided he probably didn’t even speak the language.  _ What a bastard. _

The door swung open with a creak, bringing a quick gust of cooler evening air before slamming shut with a bang. The man who stepped inside raised both hands in the familiar greeting and welcome. “Peace be upon you,” he called in the local dialect, inclining his head in a respectful bow. “A meal for me and clean water for the stable, if it pleases you.” He threw himself down onto a spare cushion at the low table as if he’d sat there a dozen times, slinging shining gold coins on the wood as if the money were practically nothing. 

The innkeep - who had seen everything under the sun in his sixty-two years running this place - was professional enough to hide his shock and amazement. He simply nodded crisply, fetched the newcomer a large bowl of hot stew with fresh, warm bread, and sent his boy running as fast as he could go with clean water and complimentary feed for the new horse in the stable. 

The newcomer accepted the bowl with a delighted smile and made his prayers to Allah (in all the correct ways, the onlookers were pleased to see). With prayers properly settled, he neatly broke his bread into thirds and offered a slice each to his neighbors at right and left - the traditional (if rather old-fashioned!) sign of good grace and hospitality when traveling among strangers. Both accepted with good cheer and friendly claps on the back. 

Already, most of the other guests were coming closer, eager to make friends with the generous newcomer. “Brother!” cried a nearby carpenter. “You bring good cheer to this place. What is your name, and where are you traveling from?”

“My name is Yusuf, and I am coming from Anxi,” he said, pointing vaguely over his shoulder in the direction of the East. “Picking up fine tea, mainly. Going to sell in Aleppo.” He swiped his bread through his stew, eating a great spoonful with enthusiasm, wiping his dark, oiled beard with a clean cloth.

Nods all around at this. Most traders in this place knew of Anxi, if they hadn’t been there themselves. Anxi’s fine, delicate leaves of tea were world-famous, picked and dried at precise times and packed in wax paper boxes, worth a fortune at the markets in Aleppo and beyond.

“A long journey, friend. Where are your people from?” This was from a smaller, wizened old woman with a thick Bukharan accent.

Yusuf grinned at this, then pointed his finger in the opposite direction - west. “Ifriqiya,” he said. “Mahdia.”

These particular syllables were as good as a map to most of the inn’s guests, who were quite familiar with the sorry tale of Mahdia’s attacks by the Franks in recent years.

“But enough about me,” Yusuf was saying. “What news from the road?”

This was a classic conversation starter at inns up and down the miles from Constantinople to Shanghai. Almost everybody was either going somewhere you’d just come from, or you were heading somewhere another person had just gone. Someone always had news from some village, someone always had a book or a scarf they wanted sent along to family at the next town, someone was forever making recommendations for the best and cleanest brothels between here and the Kush. In this particular inn, word and gossip and travel tips flowed freely. Yusuf bought a few more bowls of stew to share (and tipped generously). A few extra loaves of bread and plates of olives were passed around. And really, what were a few carafes of Greek wine between friends? In no time at all, he was practically a neighbor. 

Yusuf was partway through a story about a tavern he'd visited in Samarkand where a massive tree trunk grew up out of the floor of the place and the upper rooms were actually built up into the tops of trees. "Gorgeous, simply beautiful. But then,” he went on, dropping his voice low with disgust, “that’s when I saw that mangy pack of dogs, the Franks."

The introduction of the customary villains into the story had the expected, instantaneous, and universal effect: a wave of companionable cursing, more than a few hands forking to ward the evil eye, the occasional superstitious spit onto the floor. “True dogs,” pronounced the Bukharan, pointing a gnarled claw broadly in a northwesterly direction. “Hear, hear,” said the carpenter.

“Excuse me,” said a soft, reedy voice. He spoke Arabic, but he had a strange, clipped accent, something weird and Frankish. Although he had barely raised his voice, his unfamiliar dialect and sharp tone brought the conversation to an awkward halt. “What did you say?”

A hush fell. You could have heard a pin drop in that place. The only sound was the flicker of the firelight, the low whicker of horses and camels just outside, and the rhythmic  _ swish-swish _ of the innkeeper’s boy wiping a wet rag over the pottery, his mouth agape and his eyes darting back and forth between Yusuf and the unnamed Frank. It was obviously he who had spoken.

Yusuf raised one eyebrow in challenge. Pitching his voice loud enough to be heard clearly by all in the room, he said: “I said, ‘That’s when I saw that mangy pack of dogs, the Franks.’ Does that upset you?” Jeers and laughter at this. Yusuf grinned broadly. “If it upsets you, come and set me straight.”

The Frank did not speak or stand, but slowly brought his right hand down to his side and unfolded the black fabric there, revealing the sharp, wicked-looking crossbar hilt of a Frankish longsword. One of the women gasped. 

That kind of sword was familiar to almost everyone in this inn - the stories and etchings and laments pouring out of the carnage at Jerusalem were enough to make even the most hardened traveler piss himself like a babe in arms, and longswords precisely like that one played a fearsome role in every story. Without a word spoken, the casual contempt and superstition from the crowd turned sideways and became something darker, more fearful, shot through with venom.

Seeing this, Yusuf - strong, broad, brave, dark Yusuf - stood, throwing his robes wide and fully drawing his scimitar himself. It was a curious design, quite unlike any of the simple swords most had seen on traveling tradesmen. It was old, etched with strange characters along the hilt, the blade curving to an exquisitely lethal edge that glittered blue in the firelight. 

“If you wish to speak, speak. If you wish to fight, fight. But I do not think you have it in you, dog. You are as pale as a worm and slender as a woman. Look at you! You cannot even grow a beard.”

The Frank’s eyes narrowed at this, flashing blue-green like a storm at sea. His thin, long-fingered hand closed around the hilt of his longsword. Then, in one swift, silent motion, he stood and the sword was drawn free.

The Frank had clearly intended this to be an intimidating move, but even standing at his full height with his sword drawn, the Frank looked pitiful - pale in the low light, thin and weak, shrouded in black rags and road dust. He looked like a caricature of a Frank, like a bedraggled crow.  _ Can he even lift his weapon? _

“Ha!” jeered one of the younger tradesmen, a tall, gangly youth from Mosul. “The dog is nothing.” He pointed at Yusuf. “Twenty coin on our brother Yusuf!”

“Thirty!” cried the carpenter. 

“Fifty!” shouted the Bukharan. 

Yusuf simply stood there and smiled, letting the bets ring out around the inn and the piles of coins rack up on the table. “Friends! Calm yourselves.” Pointing the scimitar at the Frank, he said: “You, there. Dog. Do you set me straight? Do you fight? Or are you just a snivelling pup?”

The Frank cocked his head, looking for all the world like the snivelling pup in question. “You insult my people,” he said, always with that strange, clipped, halting accent. “You who eat infants and copulate with pigs.” He spat on the floorboards in contempt. Then, louder: “Yes, I will set you straight today. Bet against me if you like, but if I kill this man, I take the winnings and go.”

This could not be borne. What an unbelievable thing to say! The inn was loud with raucous laughter and jeers.

“Twenty more on Yusuf to put down this rabid beast!”

“Seventy that he takes off his head!”

Yusuf could only grin wider. “Ah, yes, Frank. You will teach me the error of my ways? So be it. Friends, brothers, sisters - if this snarling dog strikes me where I stand, he can have the winnings. I swear it. Let it be my punishment from Allah for failing in my task this day!” To seal the deal, Yusuf pricked his finger with a single drop of welling blood, grabbed a jug of wine off the table, gestured widely for all to see, then poured a libation onto the dusty floor. The message was clear.  
  
“So be it!”

“He swears it!”

“Hear, hear! Get him, brother!”

With the glove thrown and the pledge sworn, there was a moment’s hushed, anticipatory silence. 

Every eye darted between the great, smiling, powerful Yusuf and that awful Frank, who could only glare back in sullen hostility.

  
“Well? Come at me, then, if it pleases you!”

With a roar, the Frank ran forward. His hood whipped back, revealing long, straight brown hair that tumbled over his shoulders. His bright blue-green eyes were practically luminous in the light of the roaring fire. Yusuf laughed aloud, letting loose a high ululation as a battle cry, lunging forward to meet him with scimitar raised. The inn cheered wildly in response.

“Go, Yusuf!”

“Put down that little bastard!”

And then the fight began!  
  
Most of the inn’s guests that evening had only ever seen simple bare-knuckled brawls, perhaps featuring the occasional bladed weapon if one were handy. When blades appeared, they were rarely ever swords - most people usually just fought with simple daggers, basic iron shivs, the sorts of casual weapons most caravans carried. Like all barfights before and since, simple brawls like that were usually over fast - a few thrown punches, a few split lips or busted teeth, maybe a quick, sharp stab, and the fight was finished.

This was… This was something else.

With his hood thrown off and able to move freely, the Frank stunned the room by fighting like a dancer. In a few simple strokes, the long, unwieldy longsword became an elegant precision weapon. There were no beginner’s wild swings or overhand strikes; under the grace and finesse of an expert, the long edge became a refined scalpel. The sword’s range became a gift, keeping the Frank away from the scimitar while permitting him to strike one fine incision after another. In seconds, Yusuf’s shirt was in rags and he was bleeding from several places.

But Yusuf was a powerful fighter himself. His height, breadth, and reach gave him a major advantage over his smaller, weaker opponent. Where the Frank had to dodge and weave in order to strike with precision, Yusuf could charge like a bull, bringing the scimitar down in crushing blows and even throwing devastating punches with his offhand. The Frank’s technique could only work if he was given space to move, and the inn was both crowded and unfriendly. Every time he darted back to avoid a hit, the crowd shoved him back toward Yusuf. 

It wasn’t long before he received a punch in the mouth.

Amid a surge of cheers, the Frank staggered back, clapping a hand to his mouth and bringing it away bloody. He spat hard, a great glob of red smacking wetly on the floor, wavering unsteadily on his feet.

“Disgusting!”

“Finish him!”

Yusuf didn’t give the dog a moment to think. He lunged forward with a great roar, pummeling the unbalanced Frank with a series of rib-shattering bodyshots. Then he danced away, letting the Frank drop to one knee, barely holding himself upright.

“Do you surrender, dog?” he cried, throwing his arms wide. The crowd cheered again, the volume rising in pitch and joy. “I barely even have to strike you and already you kneel before me!”

“I kneel only before God,” spat the Frank. With that, he gripped his longsword and was on his feet in a flash. This time, he was clearly fighting to kill. His dance and weave and elegance became ruthless - sharp, directed, sparing absolutely no movement, leaving no opening undefended. One slash - a second - a third -

Yusuf staggered back against the bar, a great wound opened up across his abdomen, sweeping from chest down around his hip. It didn’t look wide, but it was long and deep. As he moved, it opened and wept oozing, pulsing blood.

There was a stricken, horrified silence. That was a fatal wound - and not only fatal, but a torturously slow. A gut strike wouldn’t kill Yusuf where he stood, but it would seep and bleed as he lost blood in the coming hours, infection setting in as his body failed. Anyone who had seen a stomach injury in war or during their travels knew - that was an unsurvivable slice.

The Frank drew himself up to his full height once more, then observed Yusuf consideringly. “Hmm. That looks painful. Why don’t I end it quicker?”

And with a quick, brutal upward surge, he drove his sword between the second and third ribs of Yusuf’s left side and pierced his heart.

Yusuf gagged, his eyes fluttering, his skin going ashen and grey. Between the open, seeping slice and the sword through his heart, it was a matter of seconds before the life faded from his eyes.

The Frank wrenched the sword free with a quick, experienced pull, then let the dead Yusuf slump neatly to the ground. In a flash, he pulled off his outermost layer and tossed it elegantly over Yusuf’s body, protecting his open, staring eyes from view.

The silence was deafening. All around, the inn’s visitors were simply standing in shock and horror, their hero lying dead and cooling on the floor, a tiny rivulet of blood tapping  _ drip-drip-drip _ from the tip of the longsword.

Without a word, the Frank leaned across the bar, grabbed a clean cloth, wiped both flats of the sword clean, sheathed his blade, and threw his hood back up over his head. 

Stalking over to the table, he reached out palmed all three hundred coins into a hidden purse.

“Hey!” cried the youth from Mosul. “Fuck you, you Frankish bastard!”

The Frank did not respond to this, but had his sword drawn and the tip narrowed between the youth’s eyes quicker than the young man could blink. 

When faced with his imminent demise, he could only gulp and fall silent.

No one else breathed a word.

Sword clean and coin acquired, the Frank did not look over his shoulder as he exited the front.

\- 

_ Two hours later _

\- 

Back at camp - a dark cave hidden above an unseen mountain pass, fed by a clear, cold mountain spring - Niccoló di Genova stripped himself naked as the day he was born. He prodded his black robes into the campfire to burn in a low, smoky flame. While the fire burned, he scrubbed himself clean with a knob of brown soap, bringing up great handfuls of freezing water to rinse the blood from his face. Once he was pink and clean, he wrapped himself in the fresh white linens he’d picked up in Tehran and wound his long, wet hair into a curling bun atop his head.

By the time he was clean and changed, the black rags had turned to ashes and the fire had guttered low. He stoked it back up with some extra kindling, blew on it to adjust the temperature, then put on the pot for tea. With the water slowly coming to a boil, he set to work slicing up some figs and dates, soft goat’s cheese and honeycomb.

By the time Yusuf al-Kaysani reached the camp, Niccolo had the camp positively sparkling - the packed earth swept clean, the campfire crackling high, the tent re-strung with bedroll and cushions neatly tucked inside, two steaming cups of tea placed on the soft and well-worn mat, and a veritable pile of fresh dessert cut up on a clean board. Niccolo himself was practically dancing from foot to foot with anxiety.

The second he saw Yusuf trudging through the entrance, he surged forward, arms outstretched.

Yusuf caught him in a flying hug, wrapping him up tight in a crushing embrace, burying his nose in Niccolo’s neck.

“You smell like flowers,” he said, muffled. “And you’re wet.”

“It is that awful soap from Tabriz,” Niccolo said, pulling apart long enough to look into Yusuf’s eyes. Apparently dissatisfied with what he saw, his delicate hands quickly began touching here and there, turning Yusuf’s head side to side, splaying fingers up and down his chest and belly, pressing and feeling for any open wounds. 

Yusuf caught Niccolo’s pale fingers in his hands, stilling them against his heart. “It’s okay,” he said softly. “I’m okay. I’m okay, Nico.”

“Are you sure? I did not strike you too hard?”

“Oh, you did,” said Yusuf, flashing a wry grin. “It took probably ten minutes for me to get my feeling and range of motion back. They were going to bury me at sunrise. I only barely got away when they went back in the inn for more drinks.”

Niccolo sighed and carded his hands through Yusuf’s curls, damp with dried blood. “I am sorry, love. I hate this… how do you say? This trick. I hate hurting you.”

Yusuf started pulling off his filthy, blood-soaked clothes, his muscled chest and flat stomach soon revealed as perfectly free of any marks. “It works better up north, anyway,” he said with a shrug. “Your people fear a swarthy Arab a lot more than mine fear a Frank.” He threw his clothes in a pile and headed for the stream.

“I know. I thought they weren’t going to turn on me - so I said your people lay with pigs. I am sorry I had to say such a hateful thing.”

Yusuf actually laughed at that. “I was surprised at you! My gentle, kind Nico - a priest before he ever picked up a sword, afraid to take God’s name in vain when I first met him - telling a whole inn about how they shish-kebab babies.”

“I was… what is the word. Inventing. Play-acting.”

“Improvising?”

“Yes!” Nico actually looked shamefaced.

“Hush now,” Yusuf said. “It’s okay, love. I forgive you. I know we don’t shish-kebab babies.” He stepped gingerly into the freezing mountain stream at the back of the cave. Then, in a fast stream of oaths: “Fuck! Shit! This water is going to freeze me to death. Don’t look at me, I’m half the man I ought to be at this present moment.”

Nico laughed. “Hurry up and get clean, I have got hot tea and dates here.”

Yusuf spent an agonizing few minutes bathing in the desperately cold water, finally wringing out his hair and beard before stepping into his own soft, clean clothes. At last, he threw himself down onto a cushion by the roaring fire, leaning over to give his beloved a soft, chaste kiss on his cheek. Nico smiled and handed him one of the cups of tea, along with a fresh, delectable date.

“Here you are, my hero. Thank you for making us these many hundreds of coins.”

“You are very welcome!” Yusuf said, his mouth full of date. “But you were the man of the hour - my fearsome Frank from the frozen north.”

“Ah, I was hardly fearsome,” Nico said softly. “All eyes were on you.”

“Maybe at first, but they shut up quick enough when they saw your handiwork with that sword.”

“I could have ended you in six moves,” said Nico, with not a little pride.

“Darling, you could have ended me in one,” said Yusuf. “You may have been a priest before, and religious as a saint when I met you, but you’ve always been smarter and more precise than I with that blade. I appreciated you letting me get some swings in before you finished me off.”  
  
“You are too kind,” said Nico. His eyes went a bit softer, more serious, his smile fading. “But it is true, Yusuf. I do not like this trick we play. I do not mind when you kill me, but I hate very much the feeling of my sword hurting your heart.”

Nico reached out and took Yusuf’s hand, interlacing his fingers with his own, bringing them to his lips for a chaste, dry kiss of his own. “Please, Yusuf. Do not ask me to do it anymore. If we need more coins, there are other tricks to play. We can work, we can do anything.” He kissed Yusuf’s fingers again, pressing a moment longer, eyes sliding shut.

Yusuf carefully set down his steaming cup of tea and reached across to Nico, caressing his cheek, tucking a stray lock of hair behind his ear. “It’s okay, my love. I won’t.” He swiped a thumb beneath Nico’s closed eyes. “I won’t. We won’t have to do this again.”

Nico’s eyes opened. Yusuf was shocked to see his eyes were brimming with unshed tears. 

“Oh, my love. Oh, Nico. Come here.” It was the work of a moment to pull slender, beautiful Nico into his arms, bundling him into his lap. Despite his height, Nico somehow managed to fit perfectly, resting his head against Yusuf’s shoulder. “I promise. I won’t ask again.”

“All right. I’m sorry.” Nico had slipped back into Italian. Yusuf did the same.

“It is okay,” Yusuf pronounced slowly, picking his way through the less-familiar syllables. “We will save that blade for people who truly deserve it, yes?”

“Yes, that is what I desire,” agreed Nico. His words flowed so much smoother and more elegantly in his native tongue; listening to Nico speak Italian always made Yusuf think of stacks of books and gorgeously-penned manuscripts. “If ever I raise my sword to a man again, I wish it to be because I have the full intention and purpose of ending his life on this Earth. I wish to treat it with the utmost prayer and seriousness it truly deserves."

Yusuf only really understood about two-thirds of that (Nico’s Arabic was better than his Italian), but he caught the gist.

“Yes. It will be this way,” he said. Then, back in Arabic: “I swear it to you.”

Nico sighed. In both languages, one after the other: “I love you. I love you.”

Yusuf planted a kiss atop his damp, sweet-smelling hair. “I love you.” A second kiss. “I love you.”

They sat like that for a long time, feeding each other honeycomb and figs, whispering softly into the night as the fire dwindled into embers. They spoke of many things - dreams and hopes, old jokes, memories already fading into patchwork. 

Eventually, they ate and drank their fill, exhaustion rising to meet them. Late into the night - or very early morning - they finally tamped down the fire and curled up to bed, tucked into their tiny tent, nestled deep into the darkness of the hidden cave. 

As had become exquisitely comfortable over one hundred and fifty years, Yusuf curled up behind Nico, throwing one arm protectively over his chest. Nico snugged himself into the curve of Yusuf’s body, entwining their bare feet. Both scimitar and longsword lay tucked alongside the bedroll.

“Niccoló?” whispered Yusuf.

“What.” yawned Nico.

“You were beautiful back there. In every moment. I was in awe of you.”

“You’re an incurable romantic,” Nico said. “Shut up and go to sleep. I love you.”

“I love you,” said Yusuf, brushing the softest of kisses to his lover’s temple. “Sleep well. I’ll be with you until the sun rises. And after.”

**Author's Note:**

> And that's all! Thank you again for reading my first completed fic on AO3. I would love your comments and constructive feedback. Thanks!
> 
> UPDATE: I've taken a crack at another fic in the TOG world, this one a contemporary story set post-film in Istanbul. Feel free to take a look and see if it's your cup of tea! https://archiveofourown.org/works/25948024/chapters/63074110


End file.
